bus rides are for closers

In lieu of my latest opus over my brief stint in Ohio, where I attended this years National Synchronized Swimming Competition, I have decided to post this blarg about being a real life "hero". Mainly because that post needs to be perfect, and this one doesn't.

I have had a grand total of 3 opportunities to look/be a real life hero in life, of which I am now 0 for 3. Let me give an example from the time that I would decide to stop pussing out and act the next time a situation presented itself.

My brother and I were in Barcelona visiting my sister who was working in Spain at the time. One night the three of us went out for dinner and drinks. After dinner, Scringa thought that we should go for a tour through her old neighborhood, which was rather seedy. Full of Spanish teenagers, Moroccan teenagers, and Moroccans. In other words, the barrio. It's not the kind of place you walk around at night if you are a local, let alone a tourist. As my brother and I were having our picture taken in front a wall with some graffiti on it that said; "TOURISTS YOU ARE THE TERRORISTS" smiling like a couple of dumb Americans, a young kid comes sprinting by us, followed shortly by a young woman who my sister would later tell us was screaming "Give my back my purse you dirty bitch!" As they ran by us some Spanish dude abandoned his girlfriend to give chase. It was at that moment I realized what I was witnessing. My first ever "purse snatching", and I wasn't going to do shit about it. We watched as the young man, the girl who's purse had been purloined, and the Spaniard disappeared towards yet another building designed by Guadi.

I pretended like I didn't know what was going on as I often do when there is something fucked up going on. The next morning I went to the little cafe I had been going to every morning since arriving and ordered my usual cafe con leche. Taking a seat outside I lit a cigarette and began to replay the brief scenario over in my head, only this time my brother and I joined the Spaniard, let's call him Raul, in chase. I fantasized about how we would corner that little bastard, he'd probably try and fight us, but my brother is kind of a big dude so he wouldn't stand a chance. So as my brother and Raul, were getting there hits in I would grab up the purse and return it to the grateful, young, sexy Spanish girl....and this is where the fantasy goes to places that are best dedicated to the classier of trashy romance novels, or Cinemax "pornos". In other words; we get are faulk on. That's what happens with heros.

In reality I am pretty sure Raul was led down a dark alley while chasing the purse thief, and was met by the dudes gang who all happened to have knives, and some cutting ensued.

What brought about this brief trip down memory lane? Well, yesterday a chance to be a hero arose, and it was damn near bulletproof. I got lucky and ended up on the 15 Express from downtown to Ballard, a bus I rarely catch but am glad when I can get on it because it cuts the trip home down by about 15 minutes. We are about halfway to Ballard when a you "g-ish" looking white dood with a sidewayz baseball cap comes charging to the front of the bus. The thing with express buses is that they have limited stops, hence the express part, and there is always some poor asshole who doesn't realize this and ends up having to ride the bus until they can get off and catch a normal one back to their destination. That's what most people do, that's what I've done, but this douche wasn't going to act like a civilized human, he was going to act the way he was dressed; like a privileged suburban white kid with a hard-on for 50 cent. He began first by verbally berating the driver, then (and this is what raised my ire) tried to force open the front doors of the bus, which wouldn't budge an inch. He then went back to the bus driver and got back in his face. My pulse quickened and I began looking at the other passengers, who were visibly nervous over the whole sitch. Between sizing up the dude and slowly repositioning myself on the seat so I could leap at the guy I was also looking to the other male passengers for some sort of confirmation like "If you do it dude, I'll join you." No such luck, but I figured if I at least could wrap my arms around the dickhead, some of the others would quickly join me. I calculated that this would all take only a few seconds.

There I was, about to jump out of my seat, my blood hot with rage and adrenaline, when the driver, to my surprise, actually stopped and let the asshole out! My guess is that he could see me seething in his rearview and just didn't need to be on the 7'o'clock news that night. Who could blame him though huh? Who wants to retell that embarrassing story on the news?

"So I was calmly dealing with an irate passenger like I do everyday like ten times a day, when all of the this skinny guy comes flying out his seat to try and...well I don't know what he was trying to do, but I'll tell you what, I've never seen a man go down from one punch like 'slim' there did."

Cut to b-roll of me being carried off of the bus on a gurney to the ambulance, with an oxygen mask over my face. To be honest I bet when the time comes to be a hero and I actually pull it off it will never be able to hold a candle to my actual fantasy. Really the only reason I would even consider doing something that could possibly get me hurt/killed is not for the glory but for the girl.

She happened to be sitting two seats in front me and when the guy finally got off she looked at me and smiled. We'd be faulking later.